Re:Human body-on-chip platform could speed up drug testing
by lewispollard on Thursday April 30, 2020 @05:15AM
(#23028949)
> Personhood requires a brain. Period.
Well, it requires a complex nervous system.
How many neurons are there outside of the brain?
How many neurons create a sensing, feeling being?
It's an assumption to say that the only way for consciousness around organic feeling to exist is through a brain. We don't know that.
Re:Human body-on-chip platform could speed up drug testing
by TeMPOraL on Thursday April 30, 2020 @07:25AM
(#23029695)
I was under the impression that the nervous system outside the brain is only propagating signals back and forth, and all the actual compute is localized in the brain. If that's true, then the GP's idea makes sense; if it isn't, then that's a can of worms we need to sift through eventually.
It's not. I've had this idea for some time, and I'm absolutely serious.
We already grow human cells in culture. It's like growing an extremely delicate plant. The HeLa cell line is derived from Henrietta Lacks, and she's been dead for some time. There's nothing wrong with growing and manipulating cells like this. Eukaryotic cells are as brainless as prokaryotic ones. This is how we do basic research.
We create multicellular tissue cultures, often using the extracellular matrix from cadavers. Again, basic research. Nothing wrong, nobody hurt.
If you can grow a human body without a head and brain, how is that ethically different from a plant? Please explain it to me. As long as you guarantee the brain never develops, it's ethically cleaner than telling a white lie.
Personhood requires a brain. Period.
I don't believe in a soul. So that's not an issue either.
Next explain to me why we shouldn't do this, because headless clones will cut organ transplant waiting lists to zero and help us cure cancer, diabetes, and every other human disease that doesn't directly involve the brain.